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Our Bureau

Thiruvananthapuram , June 3

THE Civil Supplies Corporation will purchase the paddy that has been procured by co-operative societies and other agencies from the farmers in the State.

The Food Minister, Mr Adoor Prakash, had convened a meeting of the co-operative societies and other procurement agencies earlier this week and decided to purchase the procured paddy. The State Cabinet approved it at its meeting on Friday.

The Chief Minister, Mr Oommen Chandy, told newspersons after the Cabinet meeting that it had also been decided to exempt paddy and coconut procurement agencies from paying purchase and sales taxes for the period between April 1, 1996 and March 31, 2000.

This was one of the issues raised by the agencies as coming in the way of procurement.

Another issue was the payment arrears to the agencies and the Chief Minister said that the Government had so far settled arrears of Rs 18 crore since October last year.

The Cabinet also decided to form a public limited company to look after the affairs of the Aralam Farm. The Government had earlier decided to allot half of the land belonging to the farm to Adivasi families and retain the other half as farm.

Referring to John Mathew Commission's report favouring mineral sand mining in the coastal areas of Alappuzha district, he said that the report would be discussed with people's representatives, trade unions, environmentalists and other interested parties before taking a decision.

This was the stand of the Government even prior to the appointment of the commission.

Regarding reports about lapses in the utilisation of central funds, Mr Chandy said that this was in respect of additional central assistance, apart from plan funds, allocated by the Planning Commission. But the funds under this head, which come as grant, will not lapse due to delay in utilisation.

He disclosed that the Government had received Rs 304 crore as additional central assistance during the last four years. Out of this, Rs 150 crore had already been utilised.

He said since this assistance was meant for special programmes, there had been delay in formulating suitable schemes to deploy the funds. The remaining Rs 154 crore had already been allotted to various departments, which would chalk out schemes to utilise the amount.

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